Wednesday, December 06, 2006

"If he is not happy, I'll punch him."

The best quote of the MLB offseason is courtesy of Orioles third baseman Melvin Mora, in reference to Miguel Tejada. Here's the rest of the context from The Baltimore Sun article:

Mora said he spoke to Tejada about five days ago and the shortstop was "excited about every move the Baltimore Orioles made." ...

"He's fine," Mora said. "He says he is 215 pounds of muscle. That's what he tells me. He says that he is going to hit 40 home runs this year and drive in 200. I was like, 'You can drive in 200.' You know how many people we left on bases [last year]?

"If he is not happy, I'll punch him," Mora said. "He's happy. Sometimes, he says something because he wants [to win], but now he is relaxed and quiet. He knows the front office is making some moves. When we talked the other day, he said, 'Wow, did you see who we signed?'"

On an interesting side note, Mora said he'd be willing to move to left field if it was in the best interest of the team. The O's need a good hitter in left ... unfortunately Mora's 2006 isn't really what the team has in mind, I don't think. A .733 OPS isn't going to cut it, but Mora's 34 and I'd like to think he'll rebound.

If he's moving to left to make room for Aubrey Huff then we have all sorts of other problems to talk about, because Huff is terrible against lefties just like the rest of the Orioles and he can't field.

By the way, J.D. Drew has signed with the Red Sox, so I'm sure we'll be able to add him to the list of mediocre sluggers that torch the Orioles once they go to the Sox or Yankees.